Human Facial Recognition Works- Up to a Point!

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fusiform gyrus (occipito-temporal gyrus).
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We are amazingly adept at recognizing faces in a crowd- to a point.  We have all heard the (not-so-funny jokes) “they all look alike” applied to all sorts of different nationalities and races.  Ninety-six (96) years ago, this phenomenon was first reported (Feingold, Journal of Criminal Law and Police Science, 1914).  And, so, it was left.  We normally assumed this is a function of prejudice or lack of knowledge.  It turns out that there is more to this- way more to this.

Dr. Jennifer Eberhardt (Stanford University) led a research study that was published in Nature Neuroscience (1991).  Using fMRI, Caucasian and African American subjects were presented color photographs of various people (either Caucasian or African American).  After examining the faces, they were asked to choose those same people from a larger sample.  Both groups of subjects were better at recognizing faces from their own race; the Caucasians were worse at recognizing African American faces.  The research was able to locate the portion of the brain that was involved in this analysis- the fusiform gyrus (the portion of the brain that was most highly activated during the exercise).

Drs. Caldera, Rousselet, and Vizioli used that knowledge (the brain locale) to effect a short study (to be published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences).  They examined the facial recognition capabilities of East Asian and Caucasian subjects (24, in total) using electroencephalography (EEG), a measurement of electrical activity resulting from neural firing.   (They did not need the elaborate fMRI system, since they were only interested in the reactions of the fusiform gyrus.)  Each subject was provided either East Asian or Caucasian target faces for recognition.

It is known that the  brain’s (cortical regions, in particular) response to a repeated stimulus is reduced when compared to the response to a novel stimulus.  (That means when you show someone the same face twice, the EEG pattern is similar, but the magnitude of the response is lower the second time. Different faces spark different activity patterns.) Dr. Caldera (et. al.) checked for this repetition suppression in this study and found none of any significance.  When the subjects were shown faces from a race different from their own, their EEG responses were basically the same; in other words, they responded as if they were seeing the same person repeatedly.  It made no difference whether the subjects were East Asian or Caucasian.

One of the potential uses of this study is to subject potential witnesses to EEG testing.  If they manifest this “other-race” effect, they could be excused as unreliable.  If you would like to see how you perform under these kind of tests (actually, closer to the study performed by Eberhardt), check out this test.  [Not as a taunt, but I scored 100%- so there’s hope for us, yet!]

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16 thoughts on “Human Facial Recognition Works- Up to a Point!”

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  6. Loved it, loved it, loved it and I scored really well…should I be happy and gleam with glory or it’s just not a big deal? I scored 96% and 86%….100% hmm….no surprises for the most intelligent blogger I know…? I really didn’t get its significance…
    Hajra recently posted..Weird Weight Loss Techniques!

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      Thanks for your comments.
      Roy

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